This page is one
of the annex pages of www.understandfrance.org, the foremost
site on Franco-American intercultural differences. It contains
documents, facts and figures illustrating the content of some
of its pages.

Facts
& figures

This page contains
Facts and Figures about France and the French. Some are significant,
other less so....

(*) : In France, the 10% richest are 9,1 times richer than the 10 poorest.

(**) Gini = 0 when all incomes are equal ; in France, the Gini coefficient went DOWN from 45 to 30 (1955-2007) and is slowly growing since 2007 (i.e. more inequalities)

Number
of embassies and consulates :

(source :
IFRAP 2004)

Embassies

International
Organizations

Consulates

Total

France

152

17

99

268

USA

166

11

72

249

UK

145

10

70

225

Germany

141

12

58

211

Italy

125

12

115

252

Roms, Gypsies, Tziganes, Gitans, Manouches, Bohemiens, etc... Like many countries in Europe, France has had on her soil for several centuries a significant population of people of "Gypsy" origin. They have different names, some of them (about half in France) are nomads and others are "sedentarized". They came from India ten centuries ago and Romania has a large population of them, traditionally very ill-treated. They have a strong culture, with different forms and some beautiful achievements (in Spain, Flamenco, in France, jazz manouche -see more details-). In France, they are, of course, French citizens. They are very attached to their tradition and in general, their popular image is very bad ("chicken thieves" in the country, mobsters in towns). During WW2 they were persecuted by the Nazis, exactly like the Jews.

Since the admission of Romania to the EU, the "Roms" (their name in Romania) can travel freely in Europe and, in France, their population has doubled (numbers are uncertain) and their condition has worsened. Roms are not nomads : they just try to escape their miserable Romanian villages to settle in Western Europe slums.

Estimated numbers of their population are (Source EU Commission, reported in Les Echos Aug.20, 2010):
Romania : 1,85 million
Bulgaria : 750 000
Spain : 725 000
Hungary : 700 000France : 400 000 (twice what it was before)
Greece : 265 000
UK : 250 000
Italy : 140 000
Germany : 105 000, etc…..
The EU rules are :
- anybody can be admitted to another EU country for 3 months maximum : beyond that limit they must have a job and/or an income
- after 5 years, they can't be expelled
The obligations of French authorities are :
- each city over 5,000 must provide a "decent" ground to the nomads for their mobile homes
- all French schools must accept nomad children as they move with their family
- when they expel Roms to Romania, they offer them a few hundred Euros, to make them accept a "voluntary" transfer.

The Romanian government is largely responsible of the problem for the Roms and for other European countries. In the European budget 2007-2013, Romania received 3.7 b. Euros ($5.2 b) to improve the life of the Romanian Roms (education, jobs, housing) so they would not be forced to emigrate. By lack of projects, only 20% were spent ...